Even in far flung Ubud, Bali I have heard the noise from Australia about the Prime Minister smacking down a chrisitan who had the tenacity to ask the PM about his back flip on marriage equality.

I can’t help but make a few comments on some of the stuff I’ve read from some christian quarters about Rudd’s comments.

And let me be really clear here. I don’t like Kevin Rudd, to me he is simply another man in a suit that is bent on keeping the job of Prime Minister and has little regard for anyone else because he knows best.

In a nutshell, a christian pastor asked the christian Prime Minister how he could now support marriage equality when Jesus himself made it clear that marriage was between a man and a woman. Rudd in his response said:

I do not believe people, when they are born, choose their sexuality. They are gay if they are born gay. You don’t decide at some later stage in life to be one thing or the other. It is – it is how people are built and, therefore, the idea that this is somehow an abnormal condition is just wrong. I don’t get that. I think that is just a completely ill-founded view.

He (Rudd) assured us that homosexuals are born that way and cannot change, thereby calling Jesus a liar for telling us he came to set people free from their sinful lifestyles.

…snip…

It (The Bible) is nothing of the sort. It is about the truth that we are condemned sinners heading to hell, and that Jesus died for our sin so that through faith and repentance we can be set free and made right with God.

Last night on ABC-TV, Prime Minster Kevin Rudd was applauded for claiming that same-sex “marriage” is compatible with Christian thought.
Based on two assumptions:
* that homosexuality is not abnormal because some people can’t help it. “They are gay if they are born gay,” he said.
Which is not factually correct. It’s far from being that simple.
* having hopefully got away with that dubious generalisation, Mr Rudd steered further off track.
“What is the fundamental principle of the New Testament…Loving your fellow man,” he said.
Well yes. But if, in fact, homosexuality is a disorder, the way to show a man love is to warn him of his problem and guide him towards a better way.

Out there on the net are plenty of other examples of christians being upset that Rudd claims that I was born gay.

Was I born gay? I don’t know. Does it matter? Not to me. Am I disordered? I don’t think so.

I don’t know why I’m gay but I can tell you that from a very early stage in my life I knew that I was gay. I may not have had the words to describe how I felt and I certainly didn’t know what it meant. But from about the age of 8 there was a part of my brain that knew that boys were far more interesting to me than girls.

In my teens I had no interest in the opposite sex and my early sexual encounters and my first serious relationship was with a man. Women didn’t figure at all. By the time I was in my 20’s this was causing me angst thanks to religion. I wasn’t ‘growing out of it’ as some people seemed to suggest. The phase I was going through seemed to be rather long.

I don’t know where my sexuality came from, but I do know how hard I tried to get rid of it. Ask my siblings about me growing up. An angry youngster.

There’s claims that my sexuality may have been caused by an absent father or lack of relationship with him, it may have been caused by sexual abuse from a man, or it might have been the devil. However, there’s 11 children, my sisters and brothers either side of me don’t appear to be gay. Our experience in growing up is very similar. I can only think that I suffer from 8th child syndrome, well known for causing gayness.

Being gay is not something that I learned to be. In fact the reverse is true. I did my best to learn to be straight. I even got married and had kids to prove that I was a true blue Aussie bloke able to scratch my nuts, spit, swear and make disgusting statements about sex.

Then for some strange reason that veneer broke down. I was angry even though I thought god had answered my prayers and given me a wife and a family. I was devout. I loved jesus and thanked him for my wonderful life. My prayers had been answered, god had taken away the ‘sin of homosexuality’ from me.

At this stage christians will tell me that I wasn’t trying hard enough, I didn’t pray hard enough, I didn’t believe hard enough. I gave in to temptation. The devil made me do it. I choose to be gay.

You’re joking, right? Christians think I made a decision to be gay and to be subjected to a world of hatred and bigotry? Some christians think I picked a sexuality that would lead me to live in a world surrounded by homophobic believers. I was a true catholic, I knew that sinners would go to hell. That’s an eternity in torment. I really believed that. Why would I pick to spend all of time in the pits of hell?

I didn’t pick being gay, it was only when I made the decision to be who I really was, to accept that my sexuality was innate that I finally found peace. It is only in a loving relationship with Michael that I have truly found myself.

This is my world. I’m not disordered or a sinner. I don’t hate god (there is no god to hate) and I don’t need god.

I don’t need religion to define me.

I’m happy for people to believe whatever they want, go for it.

I’m not happy for other people’s belief systems to impact on me. I reject that outright. It’s not ok for a pastor from Queensland to suggest that there is something wrong with me, it’s not ok for fundamentalist christians to continue the hate and the bigotry based on concepts that I have no belief in. It’s not ok for some fundamentalists to pretend that they really love me and want me to know the truth according to them.

I am not asking anyone else to be gay, I’m not trying to change anyone’s sexuality (but if Matt Damon was interested…), I just want to get on with my life, I want to spend it with Michael, we love each other, we want to be together.

I am now happy. Not because I’ve rejected religion or that I’ve taken the ‘easy path’ or given in to the sin of homosexuality. I’m happy because I have accepted who I am and I’m no longer trying to be who others think I should be.

In the straight world after 5 years of being together people would ask me when the big day was. When are we getting married.

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12 Responses to “What made me Gay?”

I knew I was not gay years before I knew what gay was or that gay even existed, from my earliest memories I was always fascinated with women their bodies how they looked and why they were different.

As I grew up the fascination and attractions just got stronger and stronger, I adore women and love the shape range and curves of their bodied both sexually and just aesthetically. Men on the other hand have no interest for me at all, I have a few male friends but I prefer the company of women.

There is no way I could “Choose” to be gay, there is no inducement in the world that would make me want to have sex with a man.

I know for me my sexuality is not a choice it is hardwired into my brain,

If my sexuality is set in stone then why would it be any different for a gay person ?

I am convinced any person who suggests that homosexuality is somehow a choice is bisexual to some degree.

If they think they may be tempted to try gay sex then they have to have some degree of same sex attraction.

Some people can choose, for the rest of us we were just born that way and nothing can or will change that.

As a 100% hetro male I support the rights of any person to choose who they love and who they wish to marry.

People ask me when are we getting married. My answer is to tell your member of parliament you want them to vote for marriage equality. You can help vote the most supportive person into office at the Federal Election this Saturday by voting wisely. Look at vote4love.com.au and see who in your electorate supports marriage equality and put them at the top of your lower house ballot paper. Similarly for the Senate paper, which you can do by voting below the line. It’s worth the extra effort. Thanks.

I must first thank Doug Steley for posting this on facebook, that is how I got to read it.
I have personally known Doug and his lovely wife Margo for about 15 years, and can vouch for his heterosexuality. He is also a good friend.
Thank you Gregory for writing this blog, wise words, but I do have trouble with gay people being devout christians.
Tell me how you can live with this when so many people believe in every word of this collection of stories, written by so many people, over so many years, and ruthlessly edited by rabid catholic monks so long ago.
This coming weekend my partner Chris and I will celebrate 40 years of partnership, a lot longer than, what, 35% of heterosexual married couples.
For the first 30 years we never even thought that one day we would be able to get married, and still are not all that chuffed by the idea, but I am determined to vote for someone who will vote for my right to marry the one that has stood at my side for so many years. The only problem is that we live in the electorate of Fisher, held by Peter Slipper, who has personally replied to my pleading, that he will not vote for equal opportunity for same sex couples. And only the Greens candidate has supported the proposal, so he gets my vote. I would like the Labor (I really hate this american spelling) guy to get in but he has no chance in this electorate, they voted in Campbell Newman in Qld, and now bemoan the fact.
Anyway enough of this ramble, we are off to Sydney for a celebration weekend.

Thanks Kevin and congratulations on 40 years, that is just amazing. I hope you have a good celebration.
Just so we’re clear, I don’t believe in god, I did for a long time, but now religion plays no part in my life.